The 1967 Topps cards were my starting point for baseball card collecting, and I had completed series 1 to 6 in 1967. The 7th series was not sold in my area, but I was able to obtain all but 5 (Seaver, Carew, Robinson, Wills, John) of those cards at card shows in the early 1980s.
In my opinion, this is the best looking series issued by Topps. -- 25-SEP-2009

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Final Card: Pedro Gonzalez

This is the last of 5 consecutive cards for Pedro Gonzalez (#424).

Pedro was signed by the Yankees in 1958, and spent the next 4 full seasons in their farm system, strictly at 2nd base until 1962, when he also played a significant amount of games at 3rd base and shortstop, as well as in the outfield.

Gonzalez made his major-league debut in April 1963 with the Yankees, but with Bobby Richardson starting 150 games at 2nd base, Gonzalez spent most of the season in triple-A. He made 4 starts at 2nd for New York, mostly in September.

In 1964, Pedro spent the entire season with the Yankees, and saw action in 80 games, more than any substitute except Phil Linz and Hector Lopez. He saw more action at 1st base than any other position.

In May 1965, Gonzalez was traded to the Indians for backup 1st baseman Ray Barker. He was the staring 2nd baseman for all but one game between May 30th and September 20th. (Cleveland has started the season with a keystone combo of Larry Brown and Dick Howser. Gonzalez replaced Brown, but by mid-season, Brown moved over to short to replace Howser. To complete this circle, Howser started most of the games at 2B after September 20th.)

Pedro was the regular 2nd baseman again in 1966, but rarely played after August. Howser, Chico Salmon, and rookie Vern Fuller each started a dozen or so games at 2nd base in place of Gonzalez.

His playing time was further reduced in 1967, as he only played in 80 games, while making 55 starts. His regular 2nd base job only lasted from May 9th to June 23rd. Cleveland started the season with rookie Gus Gill at 2B, while fellow rookie Vern Fuller took over the job as of July 19th.

Pedro's last major-league game was on September 27, 1967. He spent the next 4 seasons playing in the minors for the Indians, Cardinals, and Pirates.

Set description I posted in Zistle

The 1967 Topps set included 609 cards, the largest number to date. The cards had vertical backs, the first issued by Topps since the 1953 set. Topps used a color scheme for each team’s cards, but it was different than the scheme they used in ‘the ’66, ’68, and ’69 sets. Cards in the high-numbered 7th series are more difficult to find, due to limited distribution that late in the season.

Among the cards are 19 team cards (no Astros team), 20 manager cards, 43 rookie stars cards (down from 46 the previous year), 13 multi-player cards (from 11 teams), and 12 league leader cards. The World Series cards were also brought back, after not appearing in the 1966 set.

Notable rookie cards in the set are Tom Seaver and Rod Carew, as well as Rick Monday, Reggie Smith, Mark Belanger, and Sal Bando. The rookie cards for veterans Chris Short and Maury Wills also appear in this set, despite each of them having been in the league for many years.

Veteran players who had been in the majors continuously for several seasons (including 1967), but were not in the 1967 set were Lenny Green, Tony Horton, and Jay Ritchie. 1967 rookies with significant playing time who were omitted from the set include Gary Nolan, Don Wilson, Chuck Hartenstein, John Donaldson, Vern Fuller, and Bill Stoneman.

Significant errors in the 1967 set:The first Tigers Rookie Stars card had an incorrect player photo, which was corrected on a later card.The back of the White Sox Team card has the statistics for the Cleveland Indians.

Other quirks in the 1967 set:As mentioned above, there was no team card for the Houston Astros.Nine teams didn’t get a multi-player card, while two teams had two such cards.Standard team colors were not used on the Harmon Killebrew, Twin Terrors, and Sox Sockers cards.The final Orioles Rookie Stars card featured a red frame, while all other rookie cards had a yellow frame.All cards had facsimile autographs except for the Milt Pappas card.Bruce Brubaker had his own “solo” card, despite not having any prior major-league experience.